A while back she used Southern Airways Express to get from Philly to Pittsburgh (via Lancaster) and I had her film it, but she wanted to also film narration stuff for it that still hasn't happened!
“This is Harold Washington Library-State and Van Buren. Doors open on the right at Harold Washington Library-State and Van Buren. Transfer to red, blue, brown, orange, and purple line trains at Harold Washington Library-State and Van Buren.”
@@seanrobbins7125 trust me, I’ve been watching his videos for YEARS now (he even inspired me to break his Speedrun record for BART in the Bay Area!) The thing with NYC is that it involves being awake for 22.5 hours straight (+time before and after the attempt). Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to see him do it but it becomes as much of a physical aspect battle as anything else, even compared to any of his other crazy adventures where he was at least able to get some sleep….NOW PROVE ME WRONG MILES!
@@HorusTheLocal You’re greatly underestimating him. Miles regularly does things that are off-the-wall. He once went from South Jersey to North Jersey using only local buses. He’s gone on many cross country Greyhound trips. I can see him attempting to break the record.
I agree with your take on the skyline. Pittsburgh is a great mountainous city! Some of my other favorite skylines in the world are also mountainous cities, like Rio de Janeiro and Hong Kong! With Rainier in the background, Seattle's skyline is also stunning! Vancouver also looks great with the North Shore Mountains! The community of Library was once known as Loafer's Hollow, it was renamed Library by its residents in honor of the first library in the area, founded by John Moore in 1833. There's no library next to Library station, however, there is a public library up the line between Lytle and Mesta station in Bethel Park. The river that it crosses to reach downtown from the south at 5:25 is indeed the Monongahela. Pittsburgh's Penn Station was designed by the famed Daniel Burnham! It's also called Union Station, but that name is a misnomer since it was only served by the Pennsylvania RR as other railroads used other stations like Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad Station and the Wabash Pittsburgh Terminal. Fun fact about PCCs and their history in Pittsburgh, the very first PCC to enter revenue service was in August 1936 in Pittsburgh! Its 666 PCCs were second in number to Chicago’s 683 among US operators. It operated PCCs until 1999, one of the longest tenures of any PCC operator. Pittsburgh Railways Company began the PCC era with Car No. 100, which began carrying passengers shortly before Brooklyn’s first PCCs did. Pittsburgh rapidly expanded its PCC fleet in a bid to modernize its extensive streetcar system, which once numbered 68 lines. Pittsburgh’s PCCs routinely climbed grades up to 15%, far steeper than Muni's PCCs in San Francisco had to handle. And I know you were mentioning this was a run with no rubber tires because you were only doing the LRT and the inclines and not the BRT but wait until you find out that rubber-tyred funiculars are a thing! Like Istanbul's Tünel, the second-oldest fully underground urban railway in the world after the London Underground, and oldest in continental Europe. Created by French engineer Eugène-Henri Gavand after noticing people struggling up and down Yüksek Kaldırım Avenue and opened in January 1875. Another rubber-tyred funicular is the Funiculaire du Havre in the French port city of Le Havre. It first operated with unreliable steam coaches before switching to electric in 1911. Le Havre's funicular originally opened in 1890, but like eighty percent of the city, the funicular was destroyed during the numerous WWII air raids, so they had to rebuild it from scratch.
So my family moved to Pittsburgh in 1986 so my dad (who was a transit consultant for 40 years) could work for ICF Kaiser who had the bid for Pittsburgh rail transit extension. The library line was phase one of a proposed system with downtown as the center of a spoke shaped series of lines. Phase two was downtown to lower hill/oakland/squirrel hill/ wilkinsburg. Phase 3 was downtown to wabash tunnel (which penndot bought from a rail company and still owns though it’s unused) out to the airport via Robinson and Moon township. Phase 4 was proposed to cross the Allegheny under the riverbed then out north to Ross Park area. Neighborhood infighting, a republican governor, and the image in Harrisburg (state capitol which is clear on the other side of Pennsylvania 500 miles or so) that Pittsburgh is “too small” to need transit as well as financial distractions like the ridiculous fascination with Mag-lev in the early 2000’s led to inaction and bureaucratic infighting. to this day there is only one rail line to service the entire city. nice video, im glad you enjoyed my city.
And don't forget the fascination with highways. We have the southern beltway and mon Fayette expressway being built all around us. All rail has gotten is a worthless (but costly) extension to parking lot heaven near heinz field which gets used like 30 times a year
this looked like a lot of fun! the T is a hidden gem that not many people know about and i’m glad you got to ride it! also i’m shocked you guys were able to do it in under 3 hours, the T isn’t known for being the fastest rail system lol
Hearing you get excited about our Housing Stock™️made me feel so proud of our little city! I've always thought of our buildings as Infrastructure Jank (derogatory), but you're right, there's a fascinating beauty to the mishmash of styles, and in our history of building things on impossible hills. I love to live in buildings on hills so steep that any city planning game wouldn't let you recreate it. I should check out more of the light rail system! Thank you for the heads up about the second cars on two-car trains--that is complete jank nonsense that I never would have thought to plan for.
There's no rail transit to the airport, but at least it has the 28X Airport Flyer which serves Oakland, downtown, Shadyside, Bakery Square, and Robinson Town Centre mall where there's also an IKEA! As you mentioned, Canton Ave is close to Hampshire station, which Pittsburgh claims to be the steepest street in the US. Canton Ave is 630 ft long, and is claimed to include a 37% grade that's 21 feet long. The Guinness Book of World Records however says Baldwin Street in Dunedin, New Zealand, is the world's steepest street with a gradient of 34.8%. Even the United States record is disputed, as Bradford Street in San Francisco is said to have a 39% grade nine meters long and Waipio Valley Road in Hawaii claims to have sections as steep as a 45% grade. Duquesne in Duquesne Incline is in reference to Marquis Duquesne, who built Fort Duquesne at the confluence of the Monongahela and Allegheny Rivers in 1754, while the name Monongahela comes from the Unami language and roughly translates to "falling banks". The Duquesne and Monongahela Incline stand out in that they're the only ones in the US that use 1524 mm gauge, a gauge grouped as part of 5 ft/1520 mm/Russian gauge, a track gauge standard used in places like Finland, Russia, and Mongolia! The gauge used to be more common in the US as many railroads in the southern states used that gauge, but in 1886, around 11,500 miles of it were converted to 4 ft 9 in (1,448 mm) gauge. The Duquesne Incline was designed by Hungarian-American engineer Samuel Diescher in 1877, while the Monangahela Incline opened in 1870 was designed by Caroline Endres and her father John Endres. Working with George Ferris, Samuel also designed the machinery for the Ferris wheel at the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Caroline was one of the first female engineers in the United States, and she ended up marrying Samuel in 1872, so they're his and her inclines! Besides the Monongahela Incline, Caroline Endres also worked on the Mount Oliver Incline in 1872, but that one closed in 1951! Besides the South Busway, there's the Martin Luther King Jr. East Busway and the West Busway! The Martin Luther King Jr. East Busway serves Pittsburgh's eastern neighborhoods and suburbs. Originally a Pennsylvania Railroad line, planning for the East Busway began shortly after the Port Authority of Allegheny County purchased the Pittsburgh Railways Company in 1964. The original segment of the busway opened in February 1983, running between Downtown Pittsburgh and Edgewood, a length of 6.8 miles, and expanded to 9.1 miles in 2002! The West Busway serves western neighborhoods and suburbs, running for 5.1 miles/8.2 km from the southern shore of the Ohio River near downtown to Carnegie, following the former Panhandle Route (called such because it served WV's northern panhandle) railroad ROW. In addition to running along the abandoned railroad right of way, the West Busway also reuses the historic Cork Run Tunnel, which opened in 1865 on the original Pittsburgh and Steubenville Railroad. The Airport Flyer bus uses the West Busway as far south as Bell Station where dedicated ramps connect the Busway to Interstate 376. The Airport Flyer has a stop restriction with buses outbound to the Airport only stopping to pick up passengers, with drop-offs along the busway prohibited. And the South Busway runs for 4.3 miles/6.9 km from the Mt. Washington Transit Tunnel across the Monongahela River from Downtown Pittsburgh to the Overbrook neighborhood.
@@ChasMusic It felt like it was pretty recent (within a few years or so)! I didn't know this either until I caught the 28X in Point Breeze on Sunday! It goes down Fifth in Shadyside!
AHH. I take the Library Station every day to go downtown. When you talked about loving pittsburgh houses, you were pointing right at my house :) and yeah we still call it the T
The SS these days is more of an electrified commuter railroad than an interurban, especially after the street was pulled off the tracks in Michigan City. The only interurban remnant is the roller-coaster profile between Gary and South Bend.
OMG. I went to grad school in Pittsburgh and I used to ride the light rail for fun. Like a beast. I almost cant watch this because it is too exciting and familiar. Just like your BART video also gets me pumped up. Too close too home, lol.
Got in the door right at the buzzer. Impressive. As someone who is looking to move to Pittsburgh, I definitely loved having the light rail, inclines, and the BRT to get us around when we visited. Pittsburgh is a city that despite how hated it is, I fell in love with it. And I can't wait to move there.
1 - Love a good Aleena and Miles video! 2 - Yes, the endless houses on a hill are definitely one of my favorite parts of the Pittsburgh area. (This coming from an Oil City native). 3 - No doubt about Pittsburgh’s skyline. Finally got a good picture of it from 279 South last September. Great work as always!
I used to ride the T out to South Hills regularly cause I went to school downtown and worked at the huge Giant Eagle out there. I'm glad you find our jank charming. XD
Incline! Incline! Incline! I'm literally wearing my Duquesne Incline t-shirt watching this. I agree with you, Pittsburgh may be my favorite city in the US!
I just discovered this channel last week, and y'all do some great work! So many memories were unlocked in this video, as I lived in Bethel Park, PA right across the street from Washington Junction from 1999-2000 as a teenager. I used to take my little sister to the park in the background at 3:10 (it's right next to Washington Junction)! I spent many hours riding the T and the buses back then just to explore the city. Up to that point (I was 14-16 when I lived in the area), I had never lived in a city with that degree of freedom before, and I would find so many cool spots to shop for video games and Pokemon cards thanks to the transit system there!
YAYYYY!!! I love the PRT and how in some places the former streetcar system is very obvious on the light rail. I haven't made it all the way out to library yet but it's on my bucket list. the only time the trains have actually been full is for a pens/pirates/steelers game lol. anyways this video was great and I love seeing pittsburgh!
I really need to visit Pittsburgh, I grew up near Cincinnati and Pittsburgh always reminded me of a Cincinnati that had its stuff together more in terms of transit and urbanism in general (though Over the Rhine is something that Pittsburgh does not have). Housing stock there is similar but also different, and also awesome.
The bus lines you pointed out on the map are actually dedicated busways, built on old railroad rights-of-way, which are each host to multiple bus routes. It's a bit of a blast to speed through the city at rush hour at 50+ mph while surface road traffic is crawling. We just moved to Pittsburgh, but were able to take the Brown Line totally randomly on one of our first visits five years ago. The views coming down the side of Mt. Washington are insane!
Used to ride this 3x a week to get to work last year. Loved watching you get excited about the same goofy shit that I did. The T and Pittsburgh more generally really is great.
I do enjoy how Library station is accessible to the montour trail which can connect you to a bunch of long distance walking paths! Very awesome suburban line
In 1987, there was a trolley accident where the T exits the tunnel out of the South Hills Junction at the Smithfield Street bridge. A trolley lost its brakes in the tunnel and continued to pick up speed as it traveled down grade. I don't believe anyone was killed in that accident. However, almost exactly 70 years earlier, a trolly loaded with more than 100 people onboard crashed in the same place killing 24.
I could have sworn I already had it on my bucket list, but I didn't. So you added the Pittsburgh incline to it. You also added the Pittsburgh T, because I didn't know about those strange cars, it's weird seeing low and high floor exits.
While the Mount Washington Transit Tunnel stands out in being the only tunnel in the United States shared by bus and rail services, it's not the only road-rail tunnel left in the US! There's another in Alaska, the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel, which serves Whittier, the place where nearly all of its population lives in one building, Begich Towers! Begich Towers was built in the 1950s originally to house the US Army Corps of Engineers. Built as a rail-only tunnel in 1943 when Whittier was an important military base, it was turned into a road-rail tunnel in 2000 as a way to better connect Whittier to the rest of Alaska. They opted to do it this way instead of building a separate tunnel for cars as a cost-saving measure. It's not just a road-rail tunnel, but also the longest highway tunnel in North America at 2.5 miles long, the first designed for -40 Fahrenheit temperatures and 150 mph winds, and the first to be aired out with jet turbine ventilation. The US Army selected Whittier as a rail port during WWII because it was a shorter voyage, reduced exposure of ships to Japanese submarines, reduced the risk of Japanese bombing the port facilities because of the bad weather, and avoided the steep railroad grades required to traverse the Kenai Mountains. After the army stopped using it, Begich Towers became public housing, and many people from Hawaii, Guam, American Samoa, and the Philippines moved in! Today, Whittier has been a port of call for Alaskan cruises, and also a port for the important Alaska Marine Highway, and the Alaska Railroad uses Whittier as its connection to the rail systems in Canada and the lower 48 states by way of rail barge, with barges going all the way to Harbor Island in Seattle. For the Pittsburgh area's streetcar history, it's also worth mentioning that the iconic PBS show Mister Rogers' Neighborhood was recorded in Pittsburgh and famously features a little trolley that goes to the Neighborhood of Make-Believe. Living along the Metro-North's Hudson Line as a kid was what got me into trains and urbanism with Tarrytown, but Mister Rogers got me into the concept of trolleys/streetcars. I think it helped turn us into urbanists, because it helped us better understand walkable transit communities through the models on the show. The trolley on the show was hand-built from wood by a Toronto man named Bill Ferguson in 1967, the year before Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood premiered. During one 1984 episode of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, he visited the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum and remembered accompanying his dad on long trolley trips. Fred Rogers was originally from Latrobe which is outside Pittsburgh, known to be the place where the banana split was created! Viewers wrote to Rogers about why there were no people aboard the trolley, to which he responded that the lack of passengers encouraged kids at home to visualize themselves aboard. Rogers was a big fan of trains, and one day when it was a rainy day in NYC and he opted to take the subway instead of taking a taxi, the train was crowded in schoolchildren. But instead of them asking for his autograph, they sang his theme song in unison, turning the train into a choir (in a movie about Fred with Tom Hanks, they changed it to adults singing). Fred Rogers was an incredible person. He made the US govt realize the importance of public educational broadcasting. LBJ introduced 20 million funding for PBS before he left office, but Nixon wanted to slash it to 10 million. If it wasn't for Fred and his powerful speech when he testified to the Senate in 1969, PBS wouldn't have been able to secure the funding it needed from the government. Fred saved PBS in 1969 by reading a children's song to a senator. His speech was so powerful, it brought Senator John Pastore of Rhode Island (who chaired the Subcommittee on Communications) to tears. The senator went from mocking him to practically holding back tears.
@@flipperflapperdapper As Miles stated in this video, the downtown Seattle tunnel is no longer shared by buses and trains! It’s been LRT-only since 2019! So it no longer counts
The brown line was a regular scheduled event when ... checking notes... that station right outside the tunnel was closed due to the train derailment accident many years ago.
“We’re only doing rails no rubber tires” Paris and marseille metro lines have something to say about that Also the marseille metro doesn’t go to the university or airport either but it’s still a comprehensive system which is interesting
Greetings from Dahntahn! When I first moved here I went all the way to Library Station and walked around it, not realizing that there was basically nothing to see around it. The T is nice but dramatically underused and needs more housing and density. Shameless plug for Pro-Housing Pittsburgh: we’re trying to get TOD next to the T and busways! One of our members did a Beechview walking tour (near Fallowfield Station) and there’s a ton of missing middle housing that’s illegal now illegal under zoning. Great video! Thanks for sharing!
@@MilesinTransit there’s so much potential in Pittsburgh, it’s absolutely insane. I love living here though, hoping for some zoning/TOD legislation coming out in the next few months!
I've actually ridden the train from steel plaza to penn station and back! they were doing track work downtown. it was awesome.... now I just need to wait for the brown line and I'll get all the weird pittsburgh transit stuff done ✅
Great video! I always thought Pittsburgh was a cool city, with beautiful scenery and diverse terrain - even as a Bengals fan who hates the Steelers, I think they have one of football's nicest stadiums. I'd love to visit one day
Number one, there's a bar near the Library Station called "Hot Shots" that has really good food. Number two, while it brings back some nostalgia, they don't stop at any of the old stops on the Brown Line. Number three, don't use the elevators in the downtown stations. You will regret it.
Blue Line supremacy! The Overbrook line where the Blue and Siver lines run together is the newer section of the existing track (confusing, right?). It was rebuilt after the Red Line began service. Also, it takes about the same amount of time to go from South Hills Village to South Hills Junction as it does from First Avenue to Allegheny. It's all because of signalling. Also, the T will be getting new vehicles, date TBD. There have always been talks about bringing the T to Oakland, Cranberry, or the Airport. One more note: if you get a ConnectCard, you can ride on any transit agency in Western PA! Great video Miles and Aleena!
January 2nd ... that was only two weeks before I was in Pittsburgh. Got to ride the T from Gateway Center to Station Square, only to find that the Monongahela Incline was out of service the week I was there. Did get to take in a Penguins game (against Seattle) though. Maybe next time.
Downtown tunnels and street running with some rail right of way sections reminds me of the Muni in San Francisco. To overcome the high platforms in the Market Street tunnel, and the street stops, the floor by all the doors drops into stairs. There are high platforms at some street stops for wheelchair boarding. Of course the Muni is much more extensive and has the historic fleet for the E and F lines. (PCC cars are cool, but the wooden cars from Milan are cooler!)
Is there much at Penn Station besides the couple of Greyhounds and Amtraks a day? It is sad that such a high-quality connection was just abandoned, though.
The East Busway is there! And if PRT extended the tracks just a few hundred yards, they could add a station serving the Strip District, which gets a ton of foot traffic and doesn’t have a lot of parking.
They should! One of the T’s biggest weaknesses in my opinion is its monumental lack of transit-oriented development. Some of the stations on the Silver Line don’t even have sidewalk access. 🤦♂️
Not for my commute but every time wanted to buy groceries, go to the post-office or the bank. I had to take a funicular for almost 1 year while I lived in a small town in southern Germany. At some point it becomes mundane and just a mode of transport like any other. But it must be said it was a "modern" funicular only build in the late 1990. Still no AC and with a glass roof this thing became a sauna in summer. I did commute by bike, taking the funicular down and then the bus back up to a different hill and then walk to the office was 45 minutes. By bike it was just 15 minutes. I moved back to the city I was born and raised since then.
I learned it actually has triple-tracked portions around Bryn Mar. I guess trains have historically short-turned there (not sure how common it is atm). I also have never seen any good old material on how the service ran before the current viaduct and to Norristown TC as the line continued as the Bell Service to Allentown (at the present site of the PPL Center-now that is a fun fact)
@@history_leisure The original line went up to Strafford but after the Norristown branch opened the Strafford section closed. It used to branch off somewhere after Villanova heading north
Ah shame, I hope Cle gets its ridership back, but at the moment, our highways just aren't congested even during rush hour because they were built when we had a million residents instead of only like 250k. But they are looking into new rolling stock, which is rather exciting!
Christmas doesn’t fully end until epiphany aka January 6th. Respect the 12 days of Christmas. Then if someone is orthodox, Christmas doesn’t start until January 7th and doesn’t end until January 19th. Basically, you can keep Christmas decorations up for most of January and it’s cool. By February they should be down.
It’s Aleena in Transit! Dude… she’s a keeper… more Aleena!
Imagine Aleena in Aviation...
A while back she used Southern Airways Express to get from Philly to Pittsburgh (via Lancaster) and I had her film it, but she wanted to also film narration stuff for it that still hasn't happened!
“Library Station” sounds like a fake video game train station
theres a couple restuarants in south jersey called the library i believe they added the roman numeral to each other one
don’t piss off the mormons at uta
“This is Harold Washington Library-State and Van Buren. Doors open on the right at Harold Washington Library-State and Van Buren. Transfer to red, blue, brown, orange, and purple line trains at Harold Washington Library-State and Van Buren.”
all of them do tbh. Steel plaza, wood street, etc
🎼He left [STEEL] City, the Library Building…🏫
🎵BUT He Left ALL the BOOKs 📚to HER!!👵🏼
Carnegie! “DuKane”! Mellon-Pitt!!😳
You’re slowly just gonna become the fastest rider of every North American rail system out there!
I wonder if he’ll ever attempt the NYC subway. That could be a multi-part episode.
@@Leonard_Wilson The current record for the MTA is around 22.5 hours so, I'm not sure if even he's crazy enough to attempt that!
@@HorusTheLocal have you seen some of his videos
@@seanrobbins7125 trust me, I’ve been watching his videos for YEARS now (he even inspired me to break his Speedrun record for BART in the Bay Area!) The thing with NYC is that it involves being awake for 22.5 hours straight (+time before and after the attempt). Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to see him do it but it becomes as much of a physical aspect battle as anything else, even compared to any of his other crazy adventures where he was at least able to get some sleep….NOW PROVE ME WRONG MILES!
@@HorusTheLocal You’re greatly underestimating him. Miles regularly does things that are off-the-wall. He once went from South Jersey to North Jersey using only local buses. He’s gone on many cross country Greyhound trips. I can see him attempting to break the record.
"It's january second", methinks this one has been on the editing desk for a while
Time works differently in Pittsburgh.
The fastest T rider alive video was my first Miles in Transit all those years ago…oh wow how much time flies.
Wow, thanks so much for riding along all these years!!!
It's the origin of the "jaywalking fines incurred" running gag
"It's only January 2nd". Only 8 months 5 days later, which isn't bad compared to some *other* projects
I agree with your take on the skyline. Pittsburgh is a great mountainous city! Some of my other favorite skylines in the world are also mountainous cities, like Rio de Janeiro and Hong Kong! With Rainier in the background, Seattle's skyline is also stunning! Vancouver also looks great with the North Shore Mountains! The community of Library was once known as Loafer's Hollow, it was renamed Library by its residents in honor of the first library in the area, founded by John Moore in 1833. There's no library next to Library station, however, there is a public library up the line between Lytle and Mesta station in Bethel Park. The river that it crosses to reach downtown from the south at 5:25 is indeed the Monongahela. Pittsburgh's Penn Station was designed by the famed Daniel Burnham! It's also called Union Station, but that name is a misnomer since it was only served by the Pennsylvania RR as other railroads used other stations like Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad Station and the Wabash Pittsburgh Terminal. Fun fact about PCCs and their history in Pittsburgh, the very first PCC to enter revenue service was in August 1936 in Pittsburgh! Its 666 PCCs were second in number to Chicago’s 683 among US operators. It operated PCCs until 1999, one of the longest tenures of any PCC operator. Pittsburgh Railways Company began the PCC era with Car No. 100, which began carrying passengers shortly before Brooklyn’s first PCCs did. Pittsburgh rapidly expanded its PCC fleet in a bid to modernize its extensive streetcar system, which once numbered 68 lines. Pittsburgh’s PCCs routinely climbed grades up to 15%, far steeper than Muni's PCCs in San Francisco had to handle.
And I know you were mentioning this was a run with no rubber tires because you were only doing the LRT and the inclines and not the BRT but wait until you find out that rubber-tyred funiculars are a thing! Like Istanbul's Tünel, the second-oldest fully underground urban railway in the world after the London Underground, and oldest in continental Europe. Created by French engineer Eugène-Henri Gavand after noticing people struggling up and down Yüksek Kaldırım Avenue and opened in January 1875. Another rubber-tyred funicular is the Funiculaire du Havre in the French port city of Le Havre. It first operated with unreliable steam coaches before switching to electric in 1911. Le Havre's funicular originally opened in 1890, but like eighty percent of the city, the funicular was destroyed during the numerous WWII air raids, so they had to rebuild it from scratch.
We'd love to have you visit Kim 🥰
So my family moved to Pittsburgh in 1986 so my dad (who was a transit consultant for 40 years) could work for ICF Kaiser who had the bid for Pittsburgh rail transit extension. The library line was phase one of a proposed system with downtown as the center of a spoke shaped series of lines. Phase two was downtown to lower hill/oakland/squirrel hill/ wilkinsburg. Phase 3 was downtown to wabash tunnel (which penndot bought from a rail company and still owns though it’s unused) out to the airport via Robinson and Moon township. Phase 4 was proposed to cross the Allegheny under the riverbed then out north to Ross Park area.
Neighborhood infighting, a republican governor, and the image in Harrisburg (state capitol which is clear on the other side of Pennsylvania 500 miles or so) that Pittsburgh is “too small” to need transit as well as financial distractions like the ridiculous fascination with Mag-lev in the early 2000’s led to inaction and bureaucratic infighting. to this day there is only one rail line to service the entire city.
nice video, im glad you enjoyed my city.
And don't forget the fascination with highways. We have the southern beltway and mon Fayette expressway being built all around us. All rail has gotten is a worthless (but costly) extension to parking lot heaven near heinz field which gets used like 30 times a year
this looked like a lot of fun! the T is a hidden gem that not many people know about and i’m glad you got to ride it! also i’m shocked you guys were able to do it in under 3 hours, the T isn’t known for being the fastest rail system lol
Hearing you get excited about our Housing Stock™️made me feel so proud of our little city! I've always thought of our buildings as Infrastructure Jank (derogatory), but you're right, there's a fascinating beauty to the mishmash of styles, and in our history of building things on impossible hills. I love to live in buildings on hills so steep that any city planning game wouldn't let you recreate it.
I should check out more of the light rail system! Thank you for the heads up about the second cars on two-car trains--that is complete jank nonsense that I never would have thought to plan for.
There's no rail transit to the airport, but at least it has the 28X Airport Flyer which serves Oakland, downtown, Shadyside, Bakery Square, and Robinson Town Centre mall where there's also an IKEA! As you mentioned, Canton Ave is close to Hampshire station, which Pittsburgh claims to be the steepest street in the US. Canton Ave is 630 ft long, and is claimed to include a 37% grade that's 21 feet long. The Guinness Book of World Records however says Baldwin Street in Dunedin, New Zealand, is the world's steepest street with a gradient of 34.8%. Even the United States record is disputed, as Bradford Street in San Francisco is said to have a 39% grade nine meters long and Waipio Valley Road in Hawaii claims to have sections as steep as a 45% grade. Duquesne in Duquesne Incline is in reference to Marquis Duquesne, who built Fort Duquesne at the confluence of the Monongahela and Allegheny Rivers in 1754, while the name Monongahela comes from the Unami language and roughly translates to "falling banks". The Duquesne and Monongahela Incline stand out in that they're the only ones in the US that use 1524 mm gauge, a gauge grouped as part of 5 ft/1520 mm/Russian gauge, a track gauge standard used in places like Finland, Russia, and Mongolia! The gauge used to be more common in the US as many railroads in the southern states used that gauge, but in 1886, around 11,500 miles of it were converted to 4 ft 9 in (1,448 mm) gauge. The Duquesne Incline was designed by Hungarian-American engineer Samuel Diescher in 1877, while the Monangahela Incline opened in 1870 was designed by Caroline Endres and her father John Endres. Working with George Ferris, Samuel also designed the machinery for the Ferris wheel at the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Caroline was one of the first female engineers in the United States, and she ended up marrying Samuel in 1872, so they're his and her inclines! Besides the Monongahela Incline, Caroline Endres also worked on the Mount Oliver Incline in 1872, but that one closed in 1951!
Besides the South Busway, there's the Martin Luther King Jr. East Busway and the West Busway! The Martin Luther King Jr. East Busway serves Pittsburgh's eastern neighborhoods and suburbs. Originally a Pennsylvania Railroad line, planning for the East Busway began shortly after the Port Authority of Allegheny County purchased the Pittsburgh Railways Company in 1964. The original segment of the busway opened in February 1983, running between Downtown Pittsburgh and Edgewood, a length of 6.8 miles, and expanded to 9.1 miles in 2002! The West Busway serves western neighborhoods and suburbs, running for 5.1 miles/8.2 km from the southern shore of the Ohio River near downtown to Carnegie, following the former Panhandle Route (called such because it served WV's northern panhandle) railroad ROW. In addition to running along the abandoned railroad right of way, the West Busway also reuses the historic Cork Run Tunnel, which opened in 1865 on the original Pittsburgh and Steubenville Railroad. The Airport Flyer bus uses the West Busway as far south as Bell Station where dedicated ramps connect the Busway to Interstate 376. The Airport Flyer has a stop restriction with buses outbound to the Airport only stopping to pick up passengers, with drop-offs along the busway prohibited. And the South Busway runs for 4.3 miles/6.9 km from the Mt. Washington Transit Tunnel across the Monongahela River from Downtown Pittsburgh to the Overbrook neighborhood.
¿When did they extend the 28X to Bakery Square? The last time I took it it only went as far as CMU.
@@ChasMusic It felt like it was pretty recent (within a few years or so)! I didn't know this either until I caught the 28X in Point Breeze on Sunday! It goes down Fifth in Shadyside!
@@victorvenable587 ¡It's definitely a change for the better!
AHH. I take the Library Station every day to go downtown. When you talked about loving pittsburgh houses, you were pointing right at my house :) and yeah we still call it the T
2:13 "closest you'll get to an interurban outside of the SEPTA 101" this is south shore line erasure!!!
Yeah it's literally an interurban
The SS these days is more of an electrified commuter railroad than an interurban, especially after the street was pulled off the tracks in Michigan City. The only interurban remnant is the roller-coaster profile between Gary and South Bend.
This line is literally part of an old interurban.
OMG. I went to grad school in Pittsburgh and I used to ride the light rail for fun. Like a beast. I almost cant watch this because it is too exciting and familiar. Just like your BART video also gets me pumped up. Too close too home, lol.
Got in the door right at the buzzer. Impressive. As someone who is looking to move to Pittsburgh, I definitely loved having the light rail, inclines, and the BRT to get us around when we visited. Pittsburgh is a city that despite how hated it is, I fell in love with it. And I can't wait to move there.
1 - Love a good Aleena and Miles video!
2 - Yes, the endless houses on a hill are definitely one of my favorite parts of the Pittsburgh area. (This coming from an Oil City native).
3 - No doubt about Pittsburgh’s skyline. Finally got a good picture of it from 279 South last September.
Great work as always!
Ok, the end was just as great. 😂😂😂
I used to ride the T out to South Hills regularly cause I went to school downtown and worked at the huge Giant Eagle out there. I'm glad you find our jank charming. XD
Thanks for your video, All your library help me regulate myself and relieve me of my stress Keep going!
I've been to Paris. Pittsburgh is my bucket list place. No joke. Great video!
Incline! Incline! Incline! I'm literally wearing my Duquesne Incline t-shirt watching this. I agree with you, Pittsburgh may be my favorite city in the US!
I just discovered this channel last week, and y'all do some great work! So many memories were unlocked in this video, as I lived in Bethel Park, PA right across the street from Washington Junction from 1999-2000 as a teenager. I used to take my little sister to the park in the background at 3:10 (it's right next to Washington Junction)! I spent many hours riding the T and the buses back then just to explore the city. Up to that point (I was 14-16 when I lived in the area), I had never lived in a city with that degree of freedom before, and I would find so many cool spots to shop for video games and Pokemon cards thanks to the transit system there!
Thanks so much!!
YAYYYY!!! I love the PRT and how in some places the former streetcar system is very obvious on the light rail. I haven't made it all the way out to library yet but it's on my bucket list. the only time the trains have actually been full is for a pens/pirates/steelers game lol. anyways this video was great and I love seeing pittsburgh!
I really need to visit Pittsburgh, I grew up near Cincinnati and Pittsburgh always reminded me of a Cincinnati that had its stuff together more in terms of transit and urbanism in general (though Over the Rhine is something that Pittsburgh does not have). Housing stock there is similar but also different, and also awesome.
The bus lines you pointed out on the map are actually dedicated busways, built on old railroad rights-of-way, which are each host to multiple bus routes. It's a bit of a blast to speed through the city at rush hour at 50+ mph while surface road traffic is crawling. We just moved to Pittsburgh, but were able to take the Brown Line totally randomly on one of our first visits five years ago. The views coming down the side of Mt. Washington are insane!
Used to ride this 3x a week to get to work last year. Loved watching you get excited about the same goofy shit that I did. The T and Pittsburgh more generally really is great.
I do enjoy how Library station is accessible to the montour trail which can connect you to a bunch of long distance walking paths! Very awesome suburban line
Another cool video,Miles. 🎉
Thanks!
In 1987, there was a trolley accident where the T exits the tunnel out of the South Hills Junction at the Smithfield Street bridge. A trolley lost its brakes in the tunnel and continued to pick up speed as it traveled down grade. I don't believe anyone was killed in that accident. However, almost exactly 70 years earlier, a trolly loaded with more than 100 people onboard crashed in the same place killing 24.
I could have sworn I already had it on my bucket list, but I didn't. So you added the Pittsburgh incline to it.
You also added the Pittsburgh T, because I didn't know about those strange cars, it's weird seeing low and high floor exits.
Pittsburgh is my favorite place in the world ❤ loved this video
Transit system speed runs are fun! Glad to see another installment in the "Fastest ______ Rider Alive" series!
I have never been anywhere near Pennsylvania and I had no idea that Pittsburgh had so much elevation. Neat.
While the Mount Washington Transit Tunnel stands out in being the only tunnel in the United States shared by bus and rail services, it's not the only road-rail tunnel left in the US! There's another in Alaska, the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel, which serves Whittier, the place where nearly all of its population lives in one building, Begich Towers! Begich Towers was built in the 1950s originally to house the US Army Corps of Engineers. Built as a rail-only tunnel in 1943 when Whittier was an important military base, it was turned into a road-rail tunnel in 2000 as a way to better connect Whittier to the rest of Alaska. They opted to do it this way instead of building a separate tunnel for cars as a cost-saving measure. It's not just a road-rail tunnel, but also the longest highway tunnel in North America at 2.5 miles long, the first designed for -40 Fahrenheit temperatures and 150 mph winds, and the first to be aired out with jet turbine ventilation. The US Army selected Whittier as a rail port during WWII because it was a shorter voyage, reduced exposure of ships to Japanese submarines, reduced the risk of Japanese bombing the port facilities because of the bad weather, and avoided the steep railroad grades required to traverse the Kenai Mountains. After the army stopped using it, Begich Towers became public housing, and many people from Hawaii, Guam, American Samoa, and the Philippines moved in! Today, Whittier has been a port of call for Alaskan cruises, and also a port for the important Alaska Marine Highway, and the Alaska Railroad uses Whittier as its connection to the rail systems in Canada and the lower 48 states by way of rail barge, with barges going all the way to Harbor Island in Seattle.
For the Pittsburgh area's streetcar history, it's also worth mentioning that the iconic PBS show Mister Rogers' Neighborhood was recorded in Pittsburgh and famously features a little trolley that goes to the Neighborhood of Make-Believe. Living along the Metro-North's Hudson Line as a kid was what got me into trains and urbanism with Tarrytown, but Mister Rogers got me into the concept of trolleys/streetcars. I think it helped turn us into urbanists, because it helped us better understand walkable transit communities through the models on the show. The trolley on the show was hand-built from wood by a Toronto man named Bill Ferguson in 1967, the year before Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood premiered. During one 1984 episode of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, he visited the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum and remembered accompanying his dad on long trolley trips. Fred Rogers was originally from Latrobe which is outside Pittsburgh, known to be the place where the banana split was created! Viewers wrote to Rogers about why there were no people aboard the trolley, to which he responded that the lack of passengers encouraged kids at home to visualize themselves aboard. Rogers was a big fan of trains, and one day when it was a rainy day in NYC and he opted to take the subway instead of taking a taxi, the train was crowded in schoolchildren. But instead of them asking for his autograph, they sang his theme song in unison, turning the train into a choir (in a movie about Fred with Tom Hanks, they changed it to adults singing). Fred Rogers was an incredible person. He made the US govt realize the importance of public educational broadcasting. LBJ introduced 20 million funding for PBS before he left office, but Nixon wanted to slash it to 10 million. If it wasn't for Fred and his powerful speech when he testified to the Senate in 1969, PBS wouldn't have been able to secure the funding it needed from the government. Fred saved PBS in 1969 by reading a children's song to a senator. His speech was so powerful, it brought Senator John Pastore of Rhode Island (who chaired the Subcommittee on Communications) to tears. The senator went from mocking him to practically holding back tears.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downtown_Seattle_Transit_Tunnel
@@flipperflapperdapper As Miles stated in this video, the downtown Seattle tunnel is no longer shared by buses and trains! It’s been LRT-only since 2019! So it no longer counts
@@AverytheCubanAmerican Ah I didn't catch that he said that. And I guess I haven't been to Seattle in a while!
fred rogers is one of the people of all time
peak pittsylvanian right there
The brown line was a regular scheduled event when ... checking notes... that station right outside the tunnel was closed due to the train derailment accident many years ago.
The T's Red Line has been closed since June 15th and won't reopen until the end of August, I miss it sooooo much.....
“We’re only doing rails no rubber tires” Paris and marseille metro lines have something to say about that
Also the marseille metro doesn’t go to the university or airport either but it’s still a comprehensive system which is interesting
Greetings from Dahntahn! When I first moved here I went all the way to Library Station and walked around it, not realizing that there was basically nothing to see around it.
The T is nice but dramatically underused and needs more housing and density. Shameless plug for Pro-Housing Pittsburgh: we’re trying to get TOD next to the T and busways! One of our members did a Beechview walking tour (near Fallowfield Station) and there’s a ton of missing middle housing that’s illegal now illegal under zoning.
Great video! Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for doing such good work! The East Busway has SO much TOD, the light rail needs it too!
@@MilesinTransit there’s so much potential in Pittsburgh, it’s absolutely insane. I love living here though, hoping for some zoning/TOD legislation coming out in the next few months!
I've actually ridden the train from steel plaza to penn station and back! they were doing track work downtown. it was awesome.... now I just need to wait for the brown line and I'll get all the weird pittsburgh transit stuff done ✅
Great video! I always thought Pittsburgh was a cool city, with beautiful scenery and diverse terrain - even as a Bengals fan who hates the Steelers, I think they have one of football's nicest stadiums. I'd love to visit one day
We all love Alena. Miles, well I guess we we have to.😂 Someone has to be the narrator. Great vid.
I think this was the best tourism ad I've ever seen for Pittsburgh
Number one, there's a bar near the Library Station called "Hot Shots" that has really good food.
Number two, while it brings back some nostalgia, they don't stop at any of the old stops on the Brown Line.
Number three, don't use the elevators in the downtown stations. You will regret it.
Today's Soundbites:
5:14 Now that is a fun fact
16:31 Foamer Meter
16:42 Poor Bid
18:38 Fun Fact.mp3
18:48 Credits
Today's GEMs:
Ding 3:38 15:56
It’s been a while since Aleena’s been in a video! Wish you two the best and keep up the sick speedruns 😎
I love how every time someone posts a T video I see my neighborhood in Beechview.
Rode this and the incline when i was in Pittsburgh for a convention Jul 4th weekend, the incline was free as i rode it on july 4th.
Thank you. More please!
Blue Line supremacy! The Overbrook line where the Blue and Siver lines run together is the newer section of the existing track (confusing, right?). It was rebuilt after the Red Line began service. Also, it takes about the same amount of time to go from South Hills Village to South Hills Junction as it does from First Avenue to Allegheny. It's all because of signalling. Also, the T will be getting new vehicles, date TBD. There have always been talks about bringing the T to Oakland, Cranberry, or the Airport. One more note: if you get a ConnectCard, you can ride on any transit agency in Western PA! Great video Miles and Aleena!
Thanks!
January 2nd ... that was only two weeks before I was in Pittsburgh. Got to ride the T from Gateway Center to Station Square, only to find that the Monongahela Incline was out of service the week I was there. Did get to take in a Penguins game (against Seattle) though. Maybe next time.
It closed mere hours after we rode it! 😬
@@MilesinTransit Did you know of this when planning the "speedrun"? Crazy timing if not.
Downtown tunnels and street running with some rail right of way sections reminds me of the Muni in San Francisco. To overcome the high platforms in the Market Street tunnel, and the street stops, the floor by all the doors drops into stairs. There are high platforms at some street stops for wheelchair boarding.
Of course the Muni is much more extensive and has the historic fleet for the E and F lines. (PCC cars are cool, but the wooden cars from Milan are cooler!)
And the Boat Tram!!
My city! In fact I discovered the channel thru a blog post about a past PGH trip yinz had that took you to the Carnegie busway that I frequent 🖤💛
Pittsburgh does have a great skyline! The 'Burg is an underrated city.
I love free zone of the Pittsburgh T light rail in Downtown Pittsburgh
Nice, we work in the old P&LERR building, right at the bottom on the Mon incline and the Station Square stop.
That’s my home system! Love riding the T. Wish they’d permanently re-open the bit to Penn Station though. Cute hamster also.
Is there much at Penn Station besides the couple of Greyhounds and Amtraks a day? It is sad that such a high-quality connection was just abandoned, though.
Oh, the Heinz History Center! But they should fill in more of those parking lots to really justify restoring service.
The East Busway is there! And if PRT extended the tracks just a few hundred yards, they could add a station serving the Strip District, which gets a ton of foot traffic and doesn’t have a lot of parking.
They should! One of the T’s biggest weaknesses in my opinion is its monumental lack of transit-oriented development. Some of the stations on the Silver Line don’t even have sidewalk access. 🤦♂️
January 2nd is still Christmas. Lol. Christmas ends January 6th.
Just as a note about the PRT and the logo change: They chose three rings so you would know exactly what kind of circus you are dealing with.
PITTSBURGH MENTIONED
I think taking Aleena to the pet store and Red Robin is a good way to round out the video, especially after her gecko passed :(
The Mt Washington tunnel is closing early next year for track replacement for I think 9 months? They’ll be running along the brown line for that!
Ooh! Noted!
16:42 unexpected P O O R B I D
Nice transit system, and I love the housing stock. Mind, it's no EL.
Miles needs to support the dotting industry.
I love how you said evening rush hour. @6:30
“Do they even call it the T?” No, good that aahs
The Pittsburgh T really has german Stadtbahn vibes with the mixed Tunnel/street-running stuff.
Imagine having a funicular in your commute.
I knew a dude who did that every day during college, lived on Mt Washington and went to school downtown.
Not for my commute but every time wanted to buy groceries, go to the post-office or the bank. I had to take a funicular for almost 1 year while I lived in a small town in southern Germany.
At some point it becomes mundane and just a mode of transport like any other.
But it must be said it was a "modern" funicular only build in the late 1990.
Still no AC and with a glass roof this thing became a sauna in summer.
I did commute by bike, taking the funicular down and then the bus back up to a different hill and then walk to the office was 45 minutes. By bike it was just 15 minutes.
I moved back to the city I was born and raised since then.
@@patrickking5883I don't think this was me (only did it for the 1 year I lived on Mt. Washington during college), but I CAN confirm: it rules so hard
3:30 Santoros Pizza is shown. Unfortunately, that's a Bagel shop now.
Love the sprint from the train to the other train @ 7:30
7:08 to be fair, i think even a lot of Steelers fans will keep calling it Heinz, Acrisure is such a lame name in comparison
as they should it'll always be Heinz
The T is more insane than I thought.
It's such a fun system!
I feel we need a new "and that's a fun fact" video clip...
I really like the fun facts. However, the Covid mask evokes memories of the pandemic,
Maybe I'll run a poll to see what people think.
Welcome back Alina 😎.
2:14 Norristown High Speed Line: Am I a joke to you?
I learned it actually has triple-tracked portions around Bryn Mar. I guess trains have historically short-turned there (not sure how common it is atm). I also have never seen any good old material on how the service ran before the current viaduct and to Norristown TC as the line continued as the Bell Service to Allentown (at the present site of the PPL Center-now that is a fun fact)
@@history_leisure The original line went up to Strafford but after the Norristown branch opened the Strafford section closed. It used to branch off somewhere after Villanova heading north
@@Thatgamingdiary I know that part, but I doubt rerouting the Norristown branch on its current alignment was a P&W or Red Arrow project
@@history_leisure ye I think it was a PTC one
the steepest street in North America is, arguably, Elevator Street in Oregon City, Oregon. It is vertical yet legally listed as a street.
Fair enough! 😂 I rode that elevator long ago but it was well before I was making videos.
I wonder what percent of American rail lines miles' has done by now?
Finally a Pittsburgh T video !
It's ok Miles, nobody unironically calls it "Acrisure Stadium," it's still Heinz Field to me damnit!
female hamster: $22.99 - ferry video: priceless
gnihihihihi
I just inspected the mount Washington tunnel in May. Actually in OK shape!
Well that's good to hear!
5:32 Brown line? Sounds a bit crappy.
As a Clevelander, I must know, which city, in your opinion, between Cle and Pit, has the best light rail system?
Pit and it's not even close! It gets five times the ridership!
Ah shame, I hope Cle gets its ridership back, but at the moment, our highways just aren't congested even during rush hour because they were built when we had a million residents instead of only like 250k. But they are looking into new rolling stock, which is rather exciting!
Smart plan miles
Aleena in the house An absolute upgrade for the video She's just adorable and has a lovable vibe😂
She is a saint great video I need to go to pittsburgh
Hello, fellow Bostonian in Pittsburgh! (Except I live here now) 😃
If you think that Duquesne incline bus stop is sketchy you should check out the stop pair in the opposite direction at W Carson St lol
You really need to try Blacksburg Transit and the Virginia Breeze
The Death Escalator (Downtown Crossing, Boston, a slatted escalator which I don't think exists anymore) reminds me of Pittsburgh inclines.😄
I've seen video of that thing! I wish it was still around just for the novelty of it, but I think it was dismantled in the late 80s/early 90s.
The escalator that replaced it is safer. Of course thrill seekers like yourself might have liked to ride it...😄
Why do I hear "We're Finally Landing" by HOME? Is someone about to demonstrate a Frame Rule LIVE?!?
Damn that’s pretty fast
I love the Incline in Pittsburgh
I went into Boston on Saturday, and while I got on the red line, Miles voice was in my head because it had DOTS on the window.
Oh no!!!!!
Another banger
I live like 5 minutes away from bethel village lol, I might have seen your train go by
Good to see Aleena again. I was starting to think y'all had split up
More videos to come with her!
Dude, Pittsburgh is Classy Whale’s home turf. You missed an opportunity for a crossover.
Yeah, how in Heaven's name do you do a Pittsburgh video WITHOUT CALEB?!? Seriously, HOW?!?
maybe CW was at his parents (not in Pitt) for Christmas
It's Aleena's home turf too! 😛
@@MilesinTransit I thought Aleena was from Philadelphia
@@Leonard_Wilson She goes to school there, but she's originally from Pittsburgh and it's where her family lives.
Christmas doesn’t fully end until epiphany aka January 6th. Respect the 12 days of Christmas. Then if someone is orthodox, Christmas doesn’t start until January 7th and doesn’t end until January 19th. Basically, you can keep Christmas decorations up for most of January and it’s cool. By February they should be down.
great housing stock over there
The thing you're getting on at 9:20 looks like you're about to ride on a rollercoaster.